"Allhallowtide" is The Monochrome Set's new release

Venerable post-punks The Monochrome Set are back with a clutch of instant-classic melodies driven by lyrics that are more twisted than ever. 

When The Monochrome Set release an album called Allhallowtide, referencing the triduum of All Saints’ Eve, All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day in early spring (rather than on Halloween), you know this isn’t just another album. Instead, it’s the sort of unexpectedly strange thing you would only expect from a band like them.

“I just thought it was a nice word,” says mononymous main man Bid. ’’But it’s the title of a song as well, which is to do with a certain group of people that have a great deal of fun at humanity’s expense. They consider themselves perfect and not human.” According to Bid, the pandemic has amplified their powers, anti people are being goaded into subservience more than ever. That might sound like a conspiracy theory, and it is. “I am a conspiracy theorist,” says Bid unblinkingly. ’“Confessions Of A Lunatic’, that’s a good title for you. The more they think I’m a lunatic, the safer I’ll be.”

Haunting backing vocals add to the album’s unhinged atmosphere, but the music is as ornately poppy as ever. “You still have to entertain,” comments Bid. “I’m really good at making a song sound as if it’s six minutes, but it’s just three minutes, packed with stuff. The Monochrome Set is lyrics; lyrics with melodic vocals and everything else follows the lyrics.”

Whereas their previous album had a richer sound, Allhallowtide is more restrained. “I wanted a much barer sound. It is more direct, there are more vocals in it because there’s less guitar. And the piano is much more sympathetic to the music, it weaves itself in and around the song. It is simpler and more melodic than the past couple of albums, and the songs really come across.”

New keyboard man Athen Ayren, who was in Sleepy People in the ’90s but has mainly been teaching music since then, contributes hugely to the melodic feel and has written the last track, ‘Parapluie’. “It’s a calming coda to the album somehow,” explains Bid. “And an umbrella. The album is all about being an umbrella to the rain in the world.”